


Atlas

by emosushi



Category: The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-04
Updated: 2021-02-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 20:55:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29213766
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emosushi/pseuds/emosushi
Summary: He doesn’t want to fail.He doesn’t want to hurt anyone.
Kudos: 7





	Atlas

The world is ending. 

Well, not yet. But Link knows he’ll have to go back soon, if he is to prevent just that. For now, the air around him is deathly still, not even a breeze to stir the grasses and leaves, as if the very earth was holding its breath in anticipation for its inevitable destruction. The sky is bathed in red, sunset lost in the moon’s enormous shadow as it looms over the clock tower. Link can feel the tremors of the earth alongside his own, alongside all those who remained in town, watching their demise creep closer every second.

What he doesn’t feel is their panic, knowing their lives are in jeopardy. Because he can give them more time. What he feels is something else, something throbbing, like an ache or an afterburn. Not the sting of the realization, but of looking it in the face, what he has to do. What he is about to do. 

He is to go back three days and start over. He is to find something new, something to stop that Moon, _anything_ to face the possessed Skull Kid at the top. He is to save everyone from the end of the world, that way. He has to do it like that, or there won’t be anyone left _to_ save. 

But there’s always a consequence, one he’s been trying in vain not to focus on. He will go back, and the Moon will not fall. But everything he’s done is no more. He knows that, has known it the whole time, but— how is he meant to go along that way, not bothering to return to those who've asked for his help? How is he meant to overlook those tasks he’d accomplished in another time, when he knows what will happen down to the minute? 

He will go back in a moment. He will go back, and the Deku Princess will be returned to her prison. Her friend will be punished by the King, and if not rescued, may die. The mountain will grow cold and brittle again, and the Gorons will freeze. Lulu’s eggs will be lost, and if he does nothing, they will surely perish. Romani may — _will_ — be taken away if he is not there to stop it, he’s seen it and knows what will become of her on the final day if he fails.

The little girl whose father was turning into a monster, the one he’d just freed. They’ve only just reunited and now he must tear them apart. Return that man to his maddened state and put Pamela back in there with him. He doesn’t want to do that.

He doesn’t want to fail. He doesn’t want to _hurt anyone._

But to go back means to hurt someone. To go back means to hurt _everyone._ And all he can do is accept that, because the alternative erases the chance to fix what he’s broken a thousand times over. There is no good choice to make here. Just bad and worse.

He stares, ocarina in hand, into the Moon’s lifeless eyes, so close that he imagines its maw will open up and swallow everything he sees any moment. But he knows it won’t happen before he plays that song. He doesn’t like to wait this long, doesn't like to make the people of Clock Town fear for their lives a moment longer than he must, but — selfishly, he thinks it will be alright to wait just this one time. It's not like they would remember it. He hates to think that way, as if that fact mattered even a little, like he were above them in some way. He isn't, and he would never want to be. 

The small tremors running through the earth grow into deep, alarming quakes; He doesn’t move even still, ocarina perched just in front of his lips. And he watches. Watches the shadow creep over the town, the fields, plunging them into darkness backlit by what looked more like a sea of blood than a sky. He hadn’t felt panicked over such a sight since the first time, before he’d retrieved his Ocarina — when it really had been about to fall, and there was nothing he could do. He’d been so glad to have that power, once he'd grasped it. The power to save them, is what he’d thought.

He hadn't thought he'd ever wish to feel that way again. Being able to bend time to his will, of course it was good. But to exist on the outside as its puppeteer, above the law he's so well acquainted with, in a world no one would remember... It’s so isolating. It's so, so heavy. 

Distantly, he wonders if this is what it's like to be a god. To control the tide of time, gifted infinite chances to force fate into whatever mold he pleased. To draw paths for him and others to take, fine-tuning every action, every lack of action. If this is what it is like, he wants nothing to do with it ever again. What use is his knowledge, if he can't be there in time? What good is his meddling if it will only be undone? 

The unfathomable gift of eternity, it’s never felt like more of a curse.

No matter how much power he has, it’s nowhere close to a god, he realizes. When he thinks about the Deku scrub and Darmani, about Mikau who he’d buried with his own hands, he feels so utterly powerless. He can’t save them. No amount of starting over will allow him that, to prevent that which has already come to pass. No, he cannot save them. He cannot stop the moon. He cannot stop Skull Kid from taking the mask. Only a god could do that.

But he’s the only one who can do _this._ Who can grit his teeth and twist fate’s arm until it breaks. Knowing all their plights, it’s his responsibility.

He can try forever. 

And maybe he will.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been trying to beat Majora's Mask since I was twelve years old... I'm nearing twenty-two now and I only have Stone Tower and whatever happens after to go! When I was a kid I didn't realize the weight of /everything/ being undone when going back in time; helping all those people in one cycle but not in the other, and seeing what happens when you don't intervene, it's started to hit me more recently. Having to pick and choose where to be and when, prioritizing people in need over each other, it'd drive me crazy. Link's just a kid. 
> 
> I'm sure there are a thousand fics of this variety, none of which I've actually seen yet, so sorry if it's similar to another! 
> 
> I actually wrote this last July, it didn't occur to me to post it. So to anyone I told I would update my other fics recently: I am so sorry, but I swear I'm not slacking! (I'm totally slacking because I'm still playing MM lmao. help) Also, the title is inspired (more like stolen from) Atlas from, well, mythology! The guy who holds up the heavens and sky, it seemed fitting :")


End file.
